Official: More Than 200 Dead In Turkish Mine Explosion

A rescued miner is carried away after an explosion and fire at a coal mine in Soma, Turkey, on Tuesday.

AP

Originally published on May 14, 2014 2:59 am

Updated at 6:00 a.m. ET. Wednesday:

Authorities in Turkey say at least 205 workers have been killed after an explosion and fire at a coal mine in the western part of the country. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has declared three days of national mourning.

Update at 11:19 p.m. ET. More Than 200 Dead:

The sad count of fatalities continues to climb as AP reports at least 201 dead and more than 200 are still trapped underground after a fire and explosion in a coal mine south of Istanbul.

Update at 7:10 p.m. ET. Death Toll Climbs:

A coal mine explosion in Turkey has killed more than 150 people and trapped hundreds more in the country's west, a top official says.

Energy Minister Taner Yildiz said 780 people were working inside the mine at the time of the accident in Soma, about 155 miles southwest of Istanbul. He said 151 were killed.

The Associated Press quotes Yildiz as saying 76 mineworkers were hurt and one was in serious condition.

The figures from Yildiz came after other officials had given wildly differing accounts of the number of dead, so it's unclear how definitive the energy minister's numbers might be.

"I hope that we are able to rescue them," he said in televised comments.

Soma is in the western province of Manisa. Workers were trapped more than a mile underground.

Rescuers were pumping fresh air into the mine, but the rescue effort was being hampered by the fact that the mine was made up of tunnels that were miles long, Erdogan told NTV television, a Turkish broadcaster.

Accidents have plagued the country's growing mining industries. Between 1991 and 2008, 2,554 Turkish miners lost their lives, according to a supplement published in the British Mining Journal last year; one accident in 1992 caused more than 260 deaths.